{"id":4750,"date":"2009-07-28T15:15:56","date_gmt":"2009-07-28T21:15:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress-367309-1145705.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=4750"},"modified":"2009-07-28T15:15:56","modified_gmt":"2009-07-28T21:15:56","slug":"followup-to-an-inconvenient-truth-about-composting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/followup-to-an-inconvenient-truth-about-composting\/","title":{"rendered":"Followup to &#8220;An Inconvenient Truth about Composting&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/files\/2009\/07\/compost4.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-4751\" src=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/files\/2009\/07\/compost4.jpg\" alt=\"Compost pile\" width=\"500\" height=\"400\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>[social_buttons]<\/p>\n<p>My earlier <a title=\"An Inconvenient Truth about Composting\" href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/2009\/07\/27\/an-inconvenient-truth-about-composting\/\" target=\"_blank\">blog<\/a> about greenhouse gas emissions from composting generated a lot of good discussion so I am writing to respond.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Yes, composting is certainly better than some outcomes like food scraps going into a garbage dump which does not do anything to capture the methane<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Yes, an anaerobic digester would be a very good thing to use for most waste streams.\u00a0 A recent example is what was done at <a title=\"Gill's Onions blog posting\" href=\"http:\/\/gas2.org\/2009\/07\/21\/a-new-reason-to-cry-onions-for-energy\/\" target=\"_blank\">Gill&#8217;s Onions <\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Many wastes can also be put through a <a title=\"Pyrolysis blog post\" href=\"http:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/2009\/03\/16\/talking-trash-for-clean-power-verus-energy-is-changing-the-waste-in-landfills\/\" target=\"_blank\">fast-pyrolysis<\/a> process to form syngas and biochar.\u00a0 This is another way to get at the carbon-neutral energy that is in the manure or other waste<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Greenhouse gas emissions are not the only metric that matters as was pointed out, but manures in particular are undesirable fertilizers based on multiple other metrics as well: tendency to leach more nitrates because of extended release, more nitrous oxide emissions for the same reason, and excess levels of phosphorus relative to nitrogen leading to water pollution<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Compost is indeed a very good way to build soil carbon and that is a super important thing to do for true sustainable farming, but there are other ways to accomplish that that don&#8217;t have the greenhouse gas issues.\u00a0 One is the use of <a title=\"Biochar post\" href=\"http:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/2009\/01\/16\/biochar-a-soil-additive-that-fights-global-warming-and-is-environmentally-friendly\/\" target=\"_blank\">biochar<\/a>.\u00a0 The other is to practice no-till farming and grow cover crops which I describe in another <a title=\"Sustainable farming 50 years\" href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/2009\/07\/28\/50-years-of-truely-sustainable-agriculture-to-be-celebrated-next-year\/#more-4743\" target=\"_blank\">post<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>There may be ways of composting that don&#8217;t emit as much methane, but I&#8217;ve seen far more theoretical arguments that way with no actual measurements taken.\u00a0 As a microbiologist I have a hard time imagining how you could avoid having some anaerobic conditions in a big pile of manure.\u00a0 Starting from 14 times as much carbon equivalents as synthetic nitrogen, the process would have to be vastly improved to be acceptable<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Un-composted manure has similar drawbacks as a fertilizer.\u00a0 When it is stored for later use on a farm, at least 1-2 percent of its total methane potential gets released even with very good manure management practices<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Chicken manure is more attractive to farmers as a nitrogen source because the levels are higher, but there is every reason to believe it would generate methane in storage and during composting if someone bothered to measure it<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[social_buttons] My earlier blog about greenhouse gas emissions from composting generated a lot of good discussion so I am writing to respond. Yes, composting is certainly better than some outcomes&nbsp;[ &hellip; ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":110,"featured_media":4751,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,1],"tags":[1817,3695,844,584,845,215,3362,3694,20,3696],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Followup to &quot;An Inconvenient Truth about Composting&quot; &#8226; Sustainablog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/followup-to-an-inconvenient-truth-about-composting\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Followup to &quot;An Inconvenient Truth about Composting&quot; &#8226; Sustainablog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"[social_buttons] My earlier blog about greenhouse gas emissions from composting generated a lot of good discussion so I am writing to respond. 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